Customer Reviews

Information Design Workbook: Graphic approaches, solutions, and inspiration plus 30 case studies

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3 star:		(1)
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Length:: 0:35 Mins

Infographic artists or graphic designers who create designs to communicate ideas to people should like this book.

The summary on the preface accurately describes this book and I'll quote it here.

This book:
- Leads you through the mindset and kind of thinking that support good information design.
- Gives you an overview of the type of processes and tools you can use to create effective information design.
- Shows real-world examples of successful products
- Presents interviews with some of the premier practitioners working in the field today.



This book talks about high level concepts to give an overview to information design. The first four chapters explains the need for effective design and provides lots of examples where they are used, and how helpful they are. Some examples include direct mail, litigation graphics, etc. Interviewees relates on what works and what doesn't through their own experience.

There are several tools include to help designers. They include personas and scenario simulation, research and testing and even mundane stuff like using plain language. Of course not all might relate to everyone. I'm a newspaper artist and I don't do testing for every graphic that I produce. But they do give results for tests conducted, which can be applied to different fields.

One chapter is devoted to design principles with examples from all medium.

The last five chapters are the case studies. Each touches on a different medium and each comes with 6 real life success stories. That's 30 set of experience from the industry you can learn from.

I'll like to conclude that this book practices what it preaches. The information on the pages is laid out nicely and easy to absorb.

Here's the table of contents:
Preface - Approaching information design from a user-centric point of view
1. About information design. What is it? Who is doing it? Why is it important?
2. Process: Discovery. A step-by-step look at the research and discovery process
3. Process: Prototypes and Testing. How user research and testing help to ensure successful design
4. Design Toolkit: Visual devices to help communicate information
5. Printed Matter Case Studies. Magazines, packaging and corporate communications
6. Information Graphics Case Studies. Maps, charts, and diagrams
7. Interactive Case Studies. Websites and other screen-based projects
8. Enviromental Case Studies. Wayfinding and exhibits
9. Experimental Case Studies. Information design that pushes the envelope.

(More pictures are available on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.)

As an information designer and interaction designer, I was disappointed in the book. It was clearly written for graphic designers by a graphic designer, treats information design as a flavor (or at most, an extension) of graphic design, and consists largely of the standard portfolio-show-off fare that you'll find in so many graphic design books.

It is very, very basic. The page-to-insight ratio is quite low. Normally, I'm underlining and circling things all the time in books as I read them; I doubt that I circled more than half a dozen things in the entire 230+ pages. One of those half-dozen was an excellent analogy likening good information design to an uneventful flight.

The material about user-centered design is not inaccurate, but it is dismaying to realize that the book's target audience is visual designers who have apparently never considered that satisfying the needs of end users might be more important than indulging their own egos. Any practicing information designer who has to be told such basics as though they were insights is in big trouble.

You'll get a lot more out of the books of Edward Tufte, Stephen Few, and Richard Saul Wurman.

This is one of those books I want all my friends, colleagues and former professors to read, but I'm too scared to loan out the copy for fear they won't return it.

It is packed with useful tips, ideas, and stories, not just from the author but from information designers and agencies around the world. It's a great resource to know how processes work, what their problems are, and also who is actually out there setting the standards.

The effort the author makes to collaborate with others working in the field and to share their points of view rather than to just preach her own thoughts is what sets this book a notch above the rest.

It's a great book, whether you read it cover to cover, or use it as a source of information and inspiration. Highly recommended.

This is a very good book in general, but the Kindle version was disappointing. The illustrations, which are often detailed charts are fuzzy when enlarged. Why couldn't higher resolution versions been included in the electronic version? For a book about Information Design, not taking that extra step is disappointing.

I am the Director of Education for the Society for Environmental Graphic Design and I must say that while I have never met the authors, I am amazed at their ability to put all the issues related to Information Design in a grand context. While I work in only one small area of ID it is great to see the issues across many disciplines and the book is well put together.

Keep up the good work.

I used this book for my speech class. We had to review a book that went with our major. This book was easy to read and had great pictures.

Book is everything what person who have interest in this type of field can expect. Great explanation of research approach.
Too, too shame that arrived damaged.

I would really recommended to every one who have problems in asking the right questions.

Kim Baer knows what she is talking about. Her vast and varied client list makes her the de facto expert in the ID field. I have had the pleasure of working directly with her co-author Jill Vacarra, and the two of them make a dynamic team - exceptionally well able to explain and illustrate the concepts they are chronicling - both for the professional and the student of graphic design. BRAVO!